The complexity of vehicles continues to increase due to various factors such as increasingly stricter government regulations pertaining to fuel consumption and passenger safety, and increasingly greater customer expectations. Better trained and better informed vehicle technicians are required to service and repair the highly complex vehicles built today as compared to the vehicle technicians working on vehicles built only a few years ago or before. As a result, systems and methods that result in better trained or better informed technicians are highly desirable.
Providing vehicle service information (VSI) relevant to a vehicle or particular symptom being worked on by a vehicle technician can be quite challenging. A system that can provide VSI to a vehicle technician in a manner in which the VSI deemed to be most relevant to the vehicle or particular symptom being worked on may be highly desirable to a vehicle technician.
Providers of VSI can be broadly classified as an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) provider of VSI or an aftermarket provider of VSI. The OEM provider typically provides VSI regarding the vehicles it builds. The aftermarket provider typically does not build any vehicles, but does provide VSI regarding vehicles built by an OEM.
In many instances, certain types of VSI are not available to an OEM or aftermarket provider of VSI. For example, when a new vehicle model is introduced by an OEM, the OEM may not have written any technical service bulletins regarding the new vehicle model or certain vehicle components on the new vehicle model. As another example, as a result of owners of new vehicles typically taking the new vehicles to repair shops affiliated with the OEM while the new vehicles are still within the warranty period, the frequency of new vehicles being repaired at an aftermarket repair shop not affiliated with an OEM is typically quite low during the warranty period. Consequently, the amount of VSI based on content provided by the aftermarket repair shops during the initial warranty period of the new vehicles can be quite low or even non-existent. As still yet another example, an OEM provider of VSI may license the use of its VSI to an aftermarket provider of VSI. In some instances, the OEM provider of VSI may stop providing its VSI to the aftermarket provider because a license agreement for providing VSI to the aftermarket provider has expired.
A vehicle technician that receives VSI from a VSI provider that provides VSI in a fixed format may not be satisfied with the VSI provider if the VSI provider provides the VSI in accordance with the fixed format, especially if the fixed format includes identifying one or more categories of VSI for which the VSI provider does have any VSI to provide the vehicle technician.